Inimitable

Tony has absolutely no interest in this marriage but his mom seems to think this is a good idea. “I worked hard on finding someone you would actually get along with, Tony. I’m sure you will be happy,” she says.

Happy with someone in some random foreign nation that he’s never met before? Yeah, he gives his mom an incredulous look for that. “Something tells me this isn’t going to end well, but it’s only the rest of my life,” he mumbles. He only has to spend his entire life with some random guy, that’d been a shock, from Wakanda. The nation has been closed off for like… a ridiculously long time and now he was supposed to trust being in this country? He doesn’t even trust countries he’s spent a lot of time in- its not like omegas were treated very well basically anywhere. But hey, they were no longer regularly beaten or worse for not immediately following alpha’s instructions, what more could they want?

“Tony,” Maria says, “I did my research. T’Challa is a good match for you, you’ll get along quite well.” She looks like she believes that but Tony doesn’t, why would he? Its not like he’s ever really looked forward to being married off like he was a cow to be given away. He doesn’t care how polite T’Challa might be; he was still being used as a trading device. Its not like this was a marriage that developed out of anything but trade agreements and he personally doesn’t care for being a trading tool. He’s a damn person, not a way to sign a contract.

“I’m being used as a way for America to get resources, mom, T’Challa could be the best person on this entire planet but that wouldn’t change how insulting this is.” If he could leave he would, but there weren’t many places that were inhabitable anymore. So with limited options he’s stuck with this because it was slightly better than just dying in a desert.

“We’re doing what we need to, Tony,” she says softly. “I’m trying to make this as painless for you as possible.”

He doesn’t actually doubt that. “If you really wanted to make this painless you wouldn’t allow me to be used as a trade object. What fucking century is this? So much for omegas having rights,” he says, rolling his eyes.

“Tony we all need to do our parts,” Maria says and he lets out a harsh laugh.

“And my part is to be some random guy’s trophy husband so America can try and get vibranium. Nice.” If he could help it, and he’s more than prepared to try his best, America wouldn’t get any useful resource from Wakanda. That’s what they would get for deciding that he was an acceptable way to try and instill trade agreements.

*

T’Challa isn’t exactly sure about this marriage but his father insisted and he maybe loves his father a little too much given that he agreed to this. Shuri throws herself on his bed and lets out a long groan, “can you please get married fast, this corset is uncomfortable,” she tells him.

“I don’t care about your corset,” he says bluntly, ignoring the way she flipped him off. “I am about to marry a stranger from a foreign nation, Shuri. I don’t know what to expect. What if he hates me? What if I hate him? What if he’s racist?” he asks. That was not usually a concern of his but in this case it was pertinent.

Shuri shrugs, “if he’s racist we can make his murder look like an accident. And if he hates you he has good taste,” she says. He throws a scarf off his desk at her and makes an irritated noise when she catches it and throws it off his bed. “Seriously T’Challa, I’m sure you will figure this out. You’re alright at that,” she says.

High praise from her given that she usually spent most of her time insulting him. “And if I don’t figure this out?” he asks quietly.

“You have the rest of your life, I’m sure you will figure it out at some point. You have forever,” she sing songs, laughing when he pales a little.

“Shuri,” he says, a little more serious this time.

She sighs, “T’Challa, you will be fine,” she assures him. “You’re a good man and you will make a great king. He is lucky to have you and he will know it,” she tells him.

So with this advice he leaves to go to his wedding ceremony and that’s about when he realizes that Shuri’s advice was awful. When he meets Tony he can see the resentment written clear across his features and the tightness in his body indicates further that he has no desire to be here. Behind Tony his father gives him a look, making a small gesture to speak with the man he was about to marry.

He steps forward and smiles, “I am T’Challa, Prince of Wakanda,” he says softly.

Tony- he knew his name because his father had told him- glares at him. If looks could kill T’Challa would have been dead nine times before he hit the ground. “Tony, no fancy title,” he says back in a clipped tone. T’Challa looks over Tony’s head at his father with what he was sure was a panicked look on this face and all his father does to help is raise an eyebrow and give Tony a pointed look.

“Technically you don’t get a fancy title here either,” he says and it’s clearly the wrong thing to say because Tony’s look manages to get more poisonous. “What? I doubt your marrying me for my title,” he says, uncertain.

“I’m marrying you because you’re the least shitty prospect I have right now so instead of trying to be nice for the crowd fuck off and leave me be. I’m sure you have prince things to do,” he says, waving a hand at him to go away. He opens his mouth and considers saying something else to Tony, but then he turns and walks away instead. It doesn’t take long for his father to catch up and he sighs.

“I hope you won’t give up on being a king that easily,” T’Chaka says and T’Challa sighs.

“He wanted nothing to do with me, what did you want me to do? Force myself on him?” he asks.

T’Chaka recoils, “obviously not, T’Challa, but you could have attempted to find some kind of common ground with him. He’s been pulled from his home and shoved into an unfamiliar place with little knowledge of what life is like here. Of course he’s going to be unpleasant- if he wasn’t I would worry,” he says.

If he was pleasant T’Challa would be grateful, not worried. “How was I supposed to deal with that?” he asks half because he knows he’s being whiny and half because he’s genuinely curious about whether or not he was going to get advice here.

“How would you deal with a political disagreement?” he asks.

T’Challa gives him an unimpressed look because of course he would answer with a riddle. “This is not a political situation, this is the beginning of a marriage,” he says.

T’Chaka sighs, turning to face T’Challa. “T’Challa, to him this is politics. I told you to research America, if you don’t understand where he comes from you will not understand how to deal with him,” he says.

“Well reading about America angered me so I thought I’d wing it,” he says, earning a long, drawn out sigh from his father.

“Read, T’Challa. You have five hours before you are married,” he says, leaving T’Challa with that. Glancing back in Tony’s direction he earns nothing but more poisonous looks from the man. He would be beautiful, T’Challa notes, if he didn’t look so angry. His coloring was obviously not something he would find in Wakanda, but the striking contrast between his dark hair and eyes from his skin was a pretty combination. At least if he wasn’t glaring at T’Challa like he was hoping he’d drop dead any second now.

Movement to his left catches his eye so he looks over and finds Okoye there. “Well,” she says, giving Tony a look, “he’s not hard on the eyes at least.”

He snorts, “at the moment I think that may be the only benefit to this whole thing. He hates me,” he says.

Okoye laughs, clapping him on the shoulder, “won’t last long. You managed to win Nakia over, I’m sure this one will be just as quick to find you endearing,” she says. T’Challa seriously doubts that mostly because Nakia never hated him, she just had goals that would and did conflict with their relationship.

*

Upon reading everything he could about America T’Challa has decided that the country was beautiful but deeply flawed. And given the distinct edge back in omega rights since the rest of the world went to hell he could see why Tony was so… upset. What he didn’t seem to know was that this was not at all normal in Wakanda and that his father had his motives. T’Challa didn’t like it, but he did understand it and he had been hoping to make the best of his father’s plans.

Regardless his reading has resulted in a plan to hopefully make him at least a little endeared to Tony but he needed his sister to pull it off. Shuri, however, is less than cooperative. “Why do I have to make you seem likable, make yourself seem likable,” she tells him.

“Have you read anything about American culture? They’re quite awful there,” he says. “They have strict hierarchies.”

“We have a monarchy, T’Challa, clearly we are guilty of the same crime,” she points out.

“All human societies have some kind of hierarchy, but America’s is heavily influenced by you’re A/B/O score. Apparently omegas are lesser there, and having no idea what to expect here I can’t say I can blame him for his nerves. He’s quite brave for showing such a strong dislike though, in his culture he probably would have been hung or charged with witchcraft or something. They’re so backwards where he’s from.” But it would be helpful, he thinks, to show Tony that he would not be treated as lesser here. At least not because he was an omega- the problem here would be his foreign status. Some, like W’Kabi, thought that accepting foreigners meant dealing with all of their problems too and there were a lot of refugees these days. T’Challa didn’t necessarily agree, but he is hesitant to open the country to others- they’ve survived on secrecy and even his father thought to some extent that was necessary. That was why, as far as other nations knew, they had no more vibranium.

Shuri laughs, “witchcraft? You are so exaggerating. So what’s this go to do with me anyways?” she asks.

T’Challa squints at her a little, waiting for her to catch up but she doesn’t and he rolls his eyes. “Shuri, you are Wakanda’s technological leaders- you’re highly respected and an omega. Might gain a little trust if he knew that,” he says. Or he could hope anyways. Shuri looks like she has her doubts but he leads her to Tony’s room anyways, knocking gently when he gets to the door.

After a solid thirty seconds of no one opening he looks down at Shuri with what must be an amusing expression on his face because she starts laughing. “Can you let my brother in, I want to see you see you shrivel his ego up close and personal. It’ll make watching the wedding so much more amusing,” she says to the door, cackling as she says it. T’Challa is deeply offended, really.

But the door does open and Tony glares out, “what?” he asks. T’Challa feels all ability to function leave his body but thankfully Shuri doesn’t feel as easily intimidated and grins.

“Wow, you really have a chip on your shoulder. I mean you’ve been handed the subpar sibling but he’s not that bad,” she says, giving T’Challa a skeptical look.

“I would have preferred no siblings, thanks,” Tony says in a clipped tone. “I don’t even know why I was the unlucky one,” he mumbles.

T’Challa wrinkles his nose, “to be fair one of the options was Justin Hammer and I would honestly rather marry one of the boarder tribes rhinos,” he says. That had been the only one he had been unfortunate enough to meet and after five minutes T’Challa told his father that if he picked that one he would throw himself off a cliff. Thankfully his father had agreed that Hammer was not a suitable choice for marriage. Or conversation. Or literally anything.

Tony lets out a small laugh and for a moment he doesn’t look murderous. It’s a good look on him and T’Challa smiles. When Tony notices he goes back to glowering but Shuri is unaffected, “I have no idea who that is and apparently I don’t want to,” she says, shrugging.

“You don’t,” Tony confirms and pulls back a little, looking over his shoulder at something. “I thought maybe my tech abilities were what made me desirable but whoever made that is smarter than me,” he says, opening the door a little wider and gesturing to the train going by outside his window. “Mag lev is so not that advance in America.”

“Literally nothing is advanced in America,” T’Challa says in a disparaging tone.

Shuri laughs, “oh you should have heard this one on the way here, on about witchcraft and hangings. You’d think he was talking about sixteenth century England or something,” Shuri says.

Tony frowns, “what?”

“Yeah, he has misconceptions but don’t worry, he’s easy to train. Give him a biscuit and tell him he’s a good boy and he’s cooperative,” Shuri says, snickering.

“That is not true,” T’Challa says in his own defense but Tony laughs.

“I like you,” he says, opening the door a little wider so Shuri could step in. When T’Challa goes to move forward though he shuts the door in his face.

Well- he guessed it was a good try.

*

Shuri, a brilliant omega and a lead technological scientist that was actually smarter than him. So maybe he misjudged Wakanda but that didn’t mean he wanted to get married or have anything to do with T’Challa. The cruel irony of it all? T’Challa was actually pretty close to his type- smart, well-dressed, attractive. There was probably more if he got to know his soon-to-be-husband but he has approximately zero interest in that. Shuri he liked, and gained access to her labs later, but T’Challa? Shuri could spend all day telling him about how polite Wakanda was to omegas, that didn’t mean T’Challa wouldn’t take advantage if he thought he could try and boss Tony around and that wasn’t happening.

When he steps onto the boat though T’Challa smiles at him, looking pleased to see him even though he’s been nothing but rude since they met. Oddly he seems to mostly react well to Tony but that made no sense and Tony has to wonder what else Wakanda had in store for him. Obviously he had a use to the country, he just had no idea what it was now that he’s discovered that Shuri definitely blows his talent out of the water. And she’s clearly a ray of sunshine too, so it wasn’t like anyone here wanted his company over hers. So what was going on here?

“You’re going to want to hold on to something,” T’Challa tells him gently but Tony mostly ignores that in favor of the dancing and chants because this was so not his idea of a wedding. T’Challa was similarly dressed to him though so the king, or maybe someone else, thought to try and make him somewhat more comfortable at least. Because the rest of this? Totally wild. Made him wonder what he hell he looked like to the locals all things considered and if it weren’t for the circumstances he’d ask.

“Why would I-” he starts to ask but those women in orange bounce their spears- he couldn’t believe these people carried fucking spears- off the boat and the noise it makes isn’t natural. Neither is the wave that flows out from the boat and then things start to shake. T’Challa reaches out to steady him when he nearly falls over but he shakes T’Challa off immediately.

“Tony,” he says softly but he shakes his head.

“Don’t,” he says back. He didn’t need T’Challa and he didn’t want his help.

*

Tony isn’t any more comfortable now than he was in the morning, T’Challa can see that pretty clearly. He did sneak a few glances to Shuri throughout the ceremony though so he at least felt comfortable with someone. It wasn’t a lot but it was a start. When they get to the end part though T’Challa freezes. A kiss wasn’t part of Wakandan traditions but the intent was to blend some things Tony was familiar with into the ceremony in an attempt to make him more comfortable.

From the looks on his face this was not one of the things he would have chosen from an American wedding. He gives a somewhat panicked look to T’Challa and he shakes his head slightly. He was not going to kiss someone who had no interest in it- aside from the obvious moral dilemma he had no idea what a kiss was doing in a wedding ceremony anyways. To him the idea was foreign and strange. Tony freezes too, looks around for a moment before he sighs and leans forward, pressing a kiss to T’Challa’s lips. When he pulls away he still looks uncomfortable and T’Challa clenches his jaw.

*

He supposes it was predictable, but Tony takes off pretty much immediately after the ceremony, which makes T’Challa’s job a whole lot harder. But he does find him and when he does he gives him an unimpressed look. Tony looks annoyed, “what, I did what you wanted,” he says and T’Challa shakes his head.

“No, you didn’t. You were obviously uncomfortable with that kiss,” he says.

“So what, I don’t have a choice,” Tony tells him, rolling his eyes.

T’Challa shakes his head, “yes you do. This isn’t some kind of punishment Tony and I have no desire to kiss people who have no interest in it. That is not a Wakandan tradition and I am a prince. You could have- should have- said no and I easily could have waived it away. The people probably would have been happy to see me rid a royal wedding of a foreign practice; there was no real pressure on you. Next time say something,” he tells him.

Tony’s shoulders droop a little and he sighs. “How much freedom do I have here?” he asks bluntly.

It takes work for him to not react as badly as he wanted because that was a downright horrifying statement. “I have no desire to be a prison keeper, Tony. I don’t want to force you into anything I can help. I understand you’ve been handed an unpleasant situation here, but I don’t want to make it worse so next time you don’t want to do something tell me. I’ll do what I can to get you out of it- as a prince that probably won’t be much work.”

“Thanks,” Tony tells him in a bitter, harsh tone. Like he was pissed off that he had to thank T’Challa for affording him basic freedoms. From his point of view T’Challa supposed that’s exactly what he just did and he sighs. Convincing Tony that he had no desire to wield his position or their marriage over his head was not going to be an easy task, but convincing him was necessary nonetheless.